Wuhan Virus

Status
Not open for further replies.
sferrin said:
3 hrs to design a vaccine and 6 months before they can start trials? What's wrong with this picture?
Click to expand...

A few hours for initial design of the vaccine protein sequence. A few weeks to create the messenger RNA that would actually deliver the protein sequence. Then a couple of months to conduct safety and efficacy trials in animals. The goal is Phase 1 human trials in three months, which would be the land speed record for such a process, half the time of the previous fastest vaccine development for something comparable (Zika). And the odds are that the virus outbreak will have burned out by then anyway.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/01/28/health/coronavirus-vaccine.html
 
Last edited:
Right now Italian gov. suspended all the flights from and to China.
 
TomS said:
sferrin said:
3 hrs to design a vaccine and 6 months before they can start trials? What's wrong with this picture?
Click to expand...

A few hours for initial design of the vaccine protein sequence. A few weeks to create the messenger RNA that would actually deliver the protein sequence. Then a couple of months to conduct safety and efficacy trials in animals. The goal is Phase 1 human trials in three months, which would be the land speed record for such a process, half the time of the previous fastest vaccine development for something comparable (Zika). And the odds are that the virus outbreak will have burned out by then anyway.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/01/28/health/coronavirus-vaccine.html
Click to expand...
I wonder if we'll ever get to the point where we can reliably simulate it to the point we can skip the animal step.
 
Zootycoon said:
I’m no expert, but from the description here I don’t think this is Spanish Flu 2.0
Click to expand...

Interesting discussion of the stats in this blog by the author Nicola Griffith:
"As of right now (17:30 UTC-8, 26 January 2020) the 2019 novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV) has an infectivity rate, or R0 (pronounced R-zero) of 2.6 and appears to be accelerating. (For comparison, the flu pandemic of 1918 had an R0 = 2, and ordinary seasonal flu = 1-2.)

The 2019-nCoV fatality rate (the number of people infected who subsequently die of the virus) = 4%. (1918 flu pandemic = 2%, seasonal flu = <0.1%.)"

https://nicolagriffith.com/2020/01/26/2019-ncov-the-new-coronavirus/
 
WTH US? Do better. (Of course they have to weigh it against bringing back to the US but I'd think there'd be a way to deal with that.)
 
Hood said:
The UK Department of Health today with the latest figures gives a fatality rate of 2%. Buts its far too early to estimate how severe it is in these early stages.

https://theconversation.com/is-the-...andemic-a-biologist-explains-the-clues-130766
Click to expand...

My take on the Lancet/BBC data was based on the average age of the 99 hospitalised, being 61 and was combined with having pre existing conditions.The equivalent for the 1918 Spanish Flu was recorded as merely 28 and it took people irrespective of their prior health.

All the reports say there’s not a statistical sample yet to calculate a figure, and I guess that equally applies to the above.
 
Grey Havoc said:
Unfortunately the WHO has damaged it's own credibility to at least some degree during this crisis so far.
Click to expand...

Looks to me like the WHO can't win a trick. Remember the reaction when they declared the Swine Flu outbreak a pandemic? It wasn't. They got their fingers burnt and have been cautious ever since. This is just an example of that. They are still learning their way IMO.
 
Kadija_Man said:
Looks to me like the WHO can't win a trick. Remember the reaction when they declared the Swine Flu outbreak a pandemic? It wasn't. They got their fingers burnt and have been cautious ever since. This is just an example of that. They are still learning their way IMO.
Click to expand...

Better to be safe than sorry I guess. Things like this can get out of hand extremely fast.
 
An older title sequence that I'm surprised has not popped up sooner, but will no doubt crop up in many of the conspiracy theories about this virus...

 
 
Last edited:
Zootycoon said:
My take on the Lancet/BBC data was based on the average age of the 99 hospitalised, being 61 and was combined with having pre existing conditions.The equivalent for the 1918 Spanish Flu was recorded as merely 28 and it took people irrespective of their prior health.

All the reports say there’s not a statistical sample yet to calculate a figure, and I guess that equally applies to the above.
Click to expand...

While I agree with your conclusion that we likely need more data - and with a newly species-hopped virus we may be chasing a moving target as it mutates in its new host - age as a factor is complicated by modern research indicating Spanish Flu killed a lot of its victims via a cytokine storm - basically the immune system going berserk - which is why it killed so many young, fit people. Typical flus kill the young and the old, so we likely don't know which way this one will end up going.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.

Similar threads

Back
Top Bottom